


Mary's Maid

by Cantatrice18



Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Memories, Season/Series 04 Spoilers, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-28
Updated: 2014-01-28
Packaged: 2018-01-10 08:25:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1157351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cantatrice18/pseuds/Cantatrice18
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Spoilers for Season 4</p>
<p>Mary remembers the unique connection she's always had with Anna, how she'd begun to truly rely on the maid ten years earlier, and how each new trial and tribulation brought them closer together. Now, with Anna so fragile, she resolves to do all she can for the one servant she considers a friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mary's Maid

She’d always secretly thought of Anna as more friend than servant. With so few years’ difference in their ages, the sweet and levelheaded young woman was her best confidant, far closer to her than any of her real sisters. Anna understood her and could see past the sharpness of her words to the often painful truths that lay beneath them. Even before they’d been lady’s maid and mistress, she had still trusted Anna above all others.

When Pamuk had died so suddenly, his arms growing stiff and lifeless around her, she’d been nearly blind with panic. But the one sensible thought she was capable of listening to said that she had to find Anna, that Anna would make everything better. And she’d been right for, despite the bizarre situation, Anna had calmly thought through their options and come up with the best and simplest plan of action. It was only Lady Grantham’s final words to Anna that night that reminded her that the maid had no true obligation to protect her or the family from scandal. Yet she never doubted Anna would keep silent – Anna was one of those rare people for whom loyalty was second nature.

It was that loyalty that had led her to take Anna on as a lady’s maid, despite the young woman’s lack of qualifications for such a post. Normally, lady’s maids had years of experience and a comprehensive knowledge of fashions and etiquette so that they could help present their mistresses to best advantage, but she preferred to have a person of less experience if it meant having someone she liked and trusted waiting on her. And Anna was a quick study – within a few months it was as though the young woman had been born with all the skills needed for a lady’s maid. Dressing and undressing often became the best part of the evening, when her family’s clipped sentences and tense silences got on her nerves. Anna was always there for her.

Throughout the war, Anna had kept her sane while Matthew risked his life a thousand miles away. She, in turn, had tried to keep the woman’s spirits up when Bates was imprisoned. As she’d accompanied her maid to the trial she’d felt how Anna shook more and more while the prosecution built the case against Bates. For the first time she’d noticed how small her maid was, and the thought made her want to shield Anna from harm. She’d hoped then never to see such fear or despair in Anna’s face again.

When Anna had ‘gone quiet’, as she liked to think of it, she’d immediately been on her guard. In a single day, that spark of life in Anna’s gaze had been extinguished, and for weeks the young woman had hardly said a word. The loss of Anna’s laughter left a void impossible to fill. It was a relief, in a way, when Mrs. Hughes finally told her. At least she knew, now, what had driven all the joy from Anna’s being. She’d wanted to ring for her maid as soon as Mrs. Hughes had left, but she resisted, and focused instead on persuading her father to leave Bates in England. Until Anna was ready to confide in her, she could do nothing else.

The news about Lord Gillingham’s valet had shocked her to the core. Never had she imagined that the servant of such a thoughtful and well-mannered gentleman could be responsible for such a despicable crime. And her shock quickly turned to self-loathing as she realized what a dreadful position she’d put her maid into by unwittingly inviting the young woman’s attacker back into the house. Thanks to her Anna would be forced to sit at table with the very man who’d left her bleeding and broken, listen to him joke with the other servants as though he hadn’t a care in the world. How could she not have seen the truth sooner? She resolved, despite Anna’s protests, to speak with Lord Gillingham about Green. At the very least she could keep that vile man from coming near her maid again. She secretly hoped that something awful happened to Green so that he could feel just a hint of the suffering he’d heaped upon Anna. But she knew life was not like that; rarely did the worst criminals get what they deserved. The best she herself could do was support and protect Anna in every way, and keep such a travesty from ever occurring again.


End file.
